2025 Star World Championship in Split, Croatia - Day 5
by ISCYRA 12 Sep 2025 17:44 UTC
7-13 September 2025
Negri and Lambertenghi take Race 5 win to stay in the hunt ahead of the decisive last day
With only one race remaining in the 2025 Star World Championship, the fleet of 101 boats took to the water today for the penultimate showdown in Split, battling through shifting breeze and intense tactical decisions that reshuffled the leaderboard ahead of tomorrow's grand finale.
The day began with a scheduled one-hour delay, anticipating a later arrival of the sea breeze. Patience paid off. By 3.00 PM, the Race Committee had hoisted the flags for Race 5 in a 10-knot wind from 260, setting the stage for a classic Star Class battle across the Split Channel.
Unlike previous days, the left-hand side of the course proved to be the winning move. Those who committed early were rewarded handsomely, including 2022 World Champions Diego Negri and Sergio Lambertenghi (ITA) and Mateusz Kusznierewicz with Bruno Prada (POL/BRA), the five-time Bacardi Cup champions. The two teams rounded the first top mark in first and second, respectively, followed by the American-German pairing of Scot Barnard and Killian Weise in third.
At the downwind gate, Negri/Lambertenghi and Kusznierewicz/Prada held onto their lead, with European Champions Enrico Chieffi and Nando Colaninno (ITA) advancing into fourth. On the second upwind, the top contenders consolidated their positions. At the final top mark, the order remained unchanged at the top, though Austrians Hans Spitzauer and Christian Nehammer (AUT) made a strong move into third position.
The final downwind saw no changes at the front, with Negri and Lambertenghi taking a confident race win, followed by Kusznierewicz/Prada and Spitzauer/Nehammer, solidifying the battle among the world's best heading into the decisive last day.
"Were really upset with our performance yesterday, with ourselves more than with our results because we missed so many opportunities and we didn't read properly the racing area and after the regatta it was so easy to understand what happened. So today we were planning to clean our minds and deliver a great race, we wanted to arrive where we are now, we closed the gap. Our plan for tomorrow is to do a great regatta and try to win it, and I mean that's the only thing we can control, we cannot control the position of the other sailors", commented Bruno Prada.
"Today was beautiful, it's been beautiful sailing all week, we waited for the breeze a little bit, but that's ok as we're out there and it's beautiful, very picturesque and the race today was wonderful. The breeze came in and we got a little unfortunate approaching the line and the got into a very big light spot, very disappointing, but we have good speed upwind and we sailed pretty well and we made a few changes to the boat today to help us downwind, we've been awful downwind a little bit embarrassing, but we're better now so we just kind of hung in there and we passed a lot of boats on the last run to have a have a very good finish. It's so much better to go forward through the fleet than to go backwards like we've been doing the last few days!! So yeah, tomorrow's a big day, I guess just like every other one.." said Eric Doyle.
With five races now completed and the first discard applied, the overall standings heading into tomorrow's final race remain wide open. Paul Cayard and Frithjof Kleen (USA/GER) currently lead the championship by 4 points over fellow Americans Eric Doyle and Payson Infelise, with Mateusz Kusznierewicz and Bruno Prada (POL/BRA) just 7 points behind the leaders. Diego Negri and Sergio Lambertenghi (ITA) are also in striking distance, trailing by 11 points overall. With one race left to sail, the championship remains very much undecided—and anything can happen on the final day in Split.
The 2025 Star World Championship continues to deliver world-class competition and brilliant sailing conditions, thanks to the support of Croatel, sponsor of the event and of the daily LIVE STREAMING of all races, broadcasting the excitement of the championship to a global audience.
Watch the Star World Championship LIVE thanks to CROATEL on YouTube here.
Full results, photo and video galleries available at worlds.starchampionships.org